Derek's Blog

While we cannot control what happens to us in life, we always (and I mean always; those close to me know I rarely throw universals around) control what events mean  to us. In this way, we are in complete control of our lives. If you embrace this, it brings awesome power to you. But most people shy away from it because, as Uncle Ben said, With great power comes great responsibility . Embracing this means taking complete ownership of your life. Frankly, I suck at this. But I'm thinking about and working on it. What are some solid ways to help develop and strengthen an internal locus of control?

Do things for you, not for some other person, real or imagined. You are the only person who can make you happy, and when it's all said and done the only person you'll have to answer to is yourself. This applies in all aspects of life, but especially in business. Don't think in terms of a job , think about projects that excite you and help you grow. Don't think, "Oh, this experience will look great on my resume." Instead, ask yourself, "Will I learn something from this experience?" The industrial economy is dead, the body is decomposing as I type this. College is a middle-aged obese person with a bad heart. That is, it's dying. Don't let any charlatan tell you different. Do things for you. Explore your passions and ask questions to unearth your natural talents. Hone those talents into valuable skills people will be happy to pay you for. Strive towards who you want to be, not what others try to define you as. As Jimi Hendrix said, ...

I had an a-hah moment while in the shower a few days ago. It really was paradigm-shifting, at least to me. All actions I see as weak or negative are done out of fear. While I've thought this for some time (I even have written on the subject at least once before) at that moment I  knew  this to be true on a primal, elemental level. Instead of becoming irked or angry--both nasty vices of mine--I should take a step back, observe non-judgmentally, and try all the reasonable ways to assuage the fear. Instead of becoming angry at the what , take a step back and try to figure out the why . Instead of judgment, cultivate a detached-yet-empathetic observation of the people and events in your life.     

Rating: 10/10 I wanted to summarize this book, but I can't. I highlighted literally every single passage in this incredible book. The author personifies creativity as The Muse, and blockage as Resistance. Resistance is a constant enemy. Most of the passages are concerned with how to cultivate awareness of and fight Resistance. If you struggle with procrastination, especially in creative endeavors, this book is a necessity.

In the summer of 2002, I attended a basketball camp called Future Stars, in Pella, Iowa. It was several straight days of ten hours of basketball a day. It was difficult, demanding, and amazing. Exhausted, I slept much of the car ride home. I dreamt about basketball. Namely, reverse layups and turn around fade aways. On two occasions, I woke myself up performing the latter in my dreaming mind, which carried over to actually moving my body. My old man got a laugh out of it. Dreaming about copywriting the other night culled this memory out of storage. I believe there's a powerful message in this. If you're working hard and pursuing something your passionate about, you should dream about it. You're so engaged in getting better consciously that it carries over and manifests subconsciously as well. There's a strong case for the hypothesis that sleeping is necessary for our brains to synthesize what we learned and experience while awake.  Pursue your passions--it...

Grit, resilience, whatever you want to call it, the ability to pick one's self up after being knocked down is invaluable. Customers buy when they're ready to, not when you're ready to sell. Your pitch and product could be perfect, but if the timing is off, no dice. The best salespeople know this--it's a numbers game. Every no gets her or him closer to a yes. This is transferable to life. If the timing isn't right, it won't work. But don't be discouraged--be persistent. Learn from failures, adjust course, and try again. Life is not an attempt on the balance-beam for gold. It's a baseball career: hundreds of games each season and multiple at bats per game. You can't hit what you don't swing at though. Every time you ask is another opportunity. So don't be embarrassed or discouraged when you miss. Instead, tell yourself you're better for it and dig in. Then swing away.

Rating: 8/10 This is my third summary by Dale Carnegie in just eleven total summaries, so that should give some indication of how I feel about the man. Carnegie's prose is accessible and concrete; he gives actionable advice, not abstract ideas. His work is backed up by hours and hours of research. This book really helps me when I'm feeling anxious or depressed. I hope you get value from these notes and if you enjoy this bite-sized version, I highly recommend checking out the book. My Notes Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.

The worst trade you can make is time for money. The latter is renewable and, in reality, not even real. It's a piece of paper we as a collective agree to believe is backed by the government. The former--time--is non-renewable and the most precious commodity of all. Once it's spent, it's spent. No refunds, no exchanges. Be miserly with your time; don't sweat small dollar amounts. Invest the extra cash to have a better experience--a better time. Our whole society is geared to encourage the opposite. The industrialists spent an incredible amount of resources over decades to convince the populist things are more important than time. That it's worth working for them for a little bit of cash to buy things that propagandists convinced us we want. Our most precious commodity, bought on the cheap. Take back your time. Realize you only get one go around, and how you spend your time and attention is final and has ripple effects. As a great man once said, "Th...

"I am the greatest, I said that even before I knew I was." -Muhammad Ali There's a lot of power in this notion. By changing our physical state to reflect a way we wish we felt, we can often get closer to or achieve that desired state. Want to feel confident? Well, how would you hold yourself if you were confident? Adopt a confident posture and notice if there is any change in how you feel.  The applications for this tactic are endless. I intend to use this even more than I already do, and hope you do the same.  If you do try it and have success, please let me know how you used it.  

Rating: 7/10 This book is packed full of useful tactics for entrepreneurs, as indicated by my copious amount of notes. While some of the info is dated, there is still a ton of evergreen information in here. I have kept the Millionaire-Maker Strategies in the order they were revealed in the book. I hope you find these notes useful, and more importantly, I hope you do something with them. My Notes The Eight Best Ways to (Still) Make a Fortune from Scratch in America:

I've come to the conclusion that this blog right now is an exercise in how the sausage--in this case, me--is made. It's a way to document my progression into, hopefully, a useful and happy human being. Two of the people I most respect in business--Seth Godin and Gary Vay-ner-chuk-- both have brought up that people want to see how the sausage is made. I'm hoping that months or years from now this will be true of this blog, even if it's just for me or my family, but hopefully I have done something of impact in the world and it's useful and interesting to others. Until then, I will use this as one of the tools to find my own unique voice and hone my writing chops.

There's a popular theory that you, being a primate, are the average of the five primates you spend the most time with. Monkey see, monkey do. Said another way, you're the average of the five closest people to you. Make sure to choose these five wisely. Choose ones with a growth mindset , ones who don't sweat the small stuff, and that realize it's all small stuff. If you do not choose wisely, your life will be a living hell and will diminish you as a person, pulling you down to the level of the lowest common denominator. Don't have five people around you you feel can lift you up? It's never been easier to connect with others telepathically: books, podcasts, videos. These are all ways to observe and emulate the behaviors of people you admire. Choose your five chimps carefully, and don't be afraid or ashamed to cut out the bad ones, for your own sake and sanity.  

These words--whether stated explicitly or implicitly--are toxic. Stated explicitly, these words create psychological reactance. People whom are told this, usually children, will often do the opposite simply because they feel their freedoms are being infringed upon. Saying this also makes one look like a egotistical jerk. When these words are implicit the confrontation is more subconscious and subtle, but often times just as harmful. If a partner or subordinate does not understand why you are requesting he or she do something, this individual is far less likely to comply with the request. The reason is simple: If this person does not understand the strategy or reasoning behind your request, he or she will not believe in it and will not, in all probability, get behind it. Explicitly state the reasoning behind your request(s), and make sure each team member or individual you are communicating with understands the why behind the what. This post (and all posts like this) is not me...

One of the ways I select which books to read from the vast, unfathomable depths of the Sea of Books is by looking for recurring recommendations from guests on the Tim Ferris Show. Tim interviews top performers from every field imaginable; I find overlapping book recommendations from diverse fields to be an indicator of a great book. Using this method has led me to the Alchemist , The War of Art , and Influence . All of these books have had significant impact on the way I view the world, and I'm grateful to Tim and his guests for leading me to them. Influence became a must-read after Scott Adams--creator of Dilbert and all around interesting character--said it was a book that came up again and again while speaking to successful individuals. It did not disappoint; Dr. Cialdini has put together a succinct manual on how and why compliance techniques work. My notes are sparse, so I suggest anyone looking to be more persuasive or less susceptible to persuasion read the book. My Not...

When my self-control is beginning to wane, my mantra is now, "Don't eat the marshmallow." This mantra is derived from a series Stanford experiments on delayed gratification. Several decades ago, a team of scientists took a sample group of three year-olds (something that would probably never fly today) and placed each child in a room with a single marshmallow. They went on to tell the test subjects that they were allowed to eat the marshmallow at any time, BUT, if the child was able to not eat the one marshmallow for fifteen minutes--eons for a toddler--they would be rewarded with a second marshmallow. They then left the room, leaving the child alone (but under surveillance) with the marshmallow. Some ate it right away, others broke down and ate the marshmallow during the fifteen minutes, and a final segment was able to hold out for an additional marshmallow. Years later, the scientists checked back in with the test subjects. What they found was remarkable: the chil...

I don't mind if someone steals my work (I'd appreciate a link back to the original, but hey, it is what it is) it's really a form of flattery. But, more importantly, it's not totally mine anyway. Every idea has had some piece "stolen" from something else. You are the sum of your experiences and your parents' genes. The key here is to build upon what you've commandeered. A great comedian will take a good joke an average comedian has come up with, keep the guts, and tinker with it until it's a great joke. Experts maintain solid foundations, but knock down and constantly rebuild the facades. So steal, then riff.

The following is Chapter Thirty-Three of the Tao Te Ching : Knowing others is wisdom; Knowing the self is enlightenment. Mastering others requires force; Mastering the self needs strength. Those who know they have enough are rich. Perseverance is a sign of willpower. Those who stay where they are endure. To die but not to perish is to be eternally present.